


Mulling the situation over

by anamia



Series: Animates 'verse [4]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Crack, Gen, Noodle Incidents, pet bottles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-01-04
Packaged: 2018-03-05 00:23:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3098072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anamia/pseuds/anamia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Grantaire looked down, scuffing his right food against the floor in an entirely uncharacteristic manner. Had he been a lady and this a novel, Bahorel would have half expected a confession of love, or at least timid but sincere carnal passion. (Gentlemen, he had learned, tended to skip the foot scuffing and went straight for dramatic declarations of passion of questionable sincerity but genuine desire.) Instead, Grantaire cleared his throat a few times, determinedly avoided Bahorel's gaze, and said, "I, uh, don't know how to feed them."</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Grantaire acquires several rather unusual pets.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mulling the situation over

**Author's Note:**

> Once upon a time, way back before the great vanishing of ‘14, there was talk of [Grantaire’s pet bottles](http://pilferingapples.tumblr.com/post/100700800166/dorpmayne-pilferingapples-dorpmayne) floating around. I was, and still am, rather taken with the idea and, as humor is an easier style to write when one is up past her bed time and far, far too out of practice at writing than anything else I usually play with, I offer you more Animates ‘verse.

"They don't talk."

This was, perhaps, not the most insightful thing Bahorel could have said when faced with a red-nosed Grantaire and his newly acquired entourage of partially empty wine bottles, but this did not detract from the truth of the statement. Unlike nearly every other object that populated Bahorel's daily existence, Grantaire's bottles either refused or were incapable of communicating intelligibly. While the silverware gesticulated emphatically and the lamps moved their tassels and sputtered to make their points clear and the pillows writhed in all sorts of unmistakable ways, Grantaire's bottles... clinked. This was the only word Bahorel could find to describe the sound the bottles made as they crowded affectionately around Grantaire's ankles, for all the world like puppies eager for approval. Try as he might, Bahorel could discern no meaning in the clinking other than that which he could extrapolate from their behavior and body language.

"How dare you?" Grantaire demanded, his haughty tone rather ruined by the entirely too sardonic positioning of his eyebrows. "For all you know they could be having rousing debates on the merits of Socrates in their native tongue. Or perhaps they are declaiming Hamlet in preparation for a representation of the play that will impress all the lady bottles and urge them to uncork and share their sweet wine. How do you know that when God struck the workers of Babel he did not also give to glasswares their own tongues as he did to men? They could be engaged in intense linguistic arguments for all you know, viciously debating the merits of true chimes versus vulgar patois just as men insist on doing."

Even as he spoke, one of the bottles rubbed up against his shoes, causing a little of its contents to splash out onto the floor, narrowly avoiding Grantaire's second best boots. Bahorel snorted. "Ah, yes, quite the scholarly argument they are having, I see."

"I didn't say they were _absolutely_ discussing Shakespeare," Grantaire said, no little defensively. "I said they _could_ be." He nudged the bottle away from him, a remarkably pointless effort given that two more had congregated around his other foot and were apparently engaged in a vicious duel to settle which of them got to lean its neck against his ankle. Bahorel was hard pressed not to give in to the urge to smile.

"Even if they are engaged in the deepest contemplations of the universe's mysteries, they aren't doing so in a manner discernible to _me_ ," he said. "Which even you must admit is somewhat unprecedented."

"You _have_ given in to hubris, haven't you?" Grantaire asked with a snort. "It always was your worst sin, of course, but up until now you had not quite begun to style yourself as the second coming of Melampus. Have you always had pretensions towards the gift of tongue or is this a new development?"

Bahorel ignored the slight against his character and instead crouched down, offering a hand as he would to a timid kitten. After a few moments one of the braver bottles ventured forth to investigate this new phenomenon, braving the distance between Grantaire's boots and Bahorel's hands with as much trepidation as an explorer setting off to explore uncharted territories. Accustomed to skittish creatures, Bahorel kept still, allowing the bottle -- an elegant creature of dark green glass -- to approach him on its own time. The bottle scooted towards him and, at last, brushed against his fingers. The moment it touched his skin it jumped away, darting back to the safety of Grantaire's boots and its fellow receptacles. Bahorel stayed in that position for a few more seconds, but none of the other bottles seemed inclined to follow where their companion had led. At last he rose, clasping his hands loosely behind his back and raising his eyebrows at Grantaire. "Dare I ask what you expect me to do about this? They seem quite attached to you at the moment, and I'm afraid I don't have the time to train the whole herd -- flock? school? winery? -- in order to accustom them to my presence. If you're truly desperate to be rid of them you might try Enjolras, but his sobriety might put a damper on their enthusiasm, facility with animals notwithstanding."

Grantaire had begun shaking his head even before Bahorel brought up Enjolras, indicating an objection that ran deeper than Grantaire's entirely too muddled feelings regarding their fearless leader. "I don't... that's not the problem," Grantaire admitted. "The wretched things would die rather than be parted from me at this point, and even I am not quite heartless enough to let them perish so callously. You can mention that to Combeferre next time you see him; perhaps it will save me another ill conceived lecture about the intrinsic worth of humanity. Honestly, sometimes I think I'm the only one who notices that he's the most wretchedly optimistic of all of us -- everyone accuses Enjolras of absurd idealism, but have you ever listened to Combeferre speak? He might claim to be a rationalist believing in progress and order, but he worships at the temple of humanity more fervently than does anyone else, and more blindly at that."

One did not have to know Grantaire very well at all to translate that short speech into 'I have grown entirely too attached to these bottles but cannot bear to admit to such a thing.' Bahorel, who knew Grantaire a great deal better than most, did not bother refraining from rolling his eyes. "You can have that conversation with him yourself and save me the headache. What do you expect of me, if this is not a visit whose goal is attempting to convince me to take custody of your vineyard of bottles?"

Grantaire looked down, scuffing his right food against the floor in an entirely uncharacteristic manner. Had he been a lady and this a novel, Bahorel would have half expected a confession of love, or at least timid but sincere carnal passion. (Gentlemen, he had learned, tended to skip the foot scuffing and went straight for dramatic declarations of passion of questionable sincerity but genuine desire.) Instead, Grantaire cleared his throat a few times, determinedly avoided Bahorel's gaze, and said, "I, uh, don't know how to feed them."

It took a Herculean effort on Bahorel's part not to burst into gales of laughter at Grantaire's embarrassed and slightly haunted expression as he confessed to this terrible sin, one which spoke volumes about the past few days failed experiments in that realm. He managed to contain himself to a grin and a chuckle and, arms crossed over his chest, said, "You have come to entirely the wrong person in that case. Might I suggest that you try Joly instead? And wait for me to collect my hat -- this is a conversation I absolutely must witness."

*

Grantaire did not wait for Bahorel to collect his hat. He did, however, take the entirely novel step of following Bahorel's advice, and so it was that when Bahorel turned up at Joly's door an hour later, having taken the time to not only find his hat but rescue the smallest spoon from a precarious position atop the tallest shelf and set out food for the pillows to fight over, he found Grantaire sitting in Joly's only decent chair, glass in hand, as Joly lay sprawled on the floor trying to coax the last of the bottles away from Grantaire's boots. Bossuet was nowhere to be seen, though Bahorel suspected he would turn up sooner rather than later.

"I see you made it after all," Grantaire said, not turning around in his seat to verify Bahorel's identity. Whether he actually knew that it was Bahorel who had entered or whether he had merely chosen an opening line that would apply to any of the people likely to burst into Joly's rooms without knocking was a mystery for the ages, and not one Bahorel felt inclined to crack. Every man was entitled to his own mystique, and it would be poor form indeed to attempt to divest Grantaire of his, clumsy thought it might be upon close examination.

"One of the knives is teething," Bahorel said with a shrug, divesting himself of both coat and hat and tossing them over a much less presentable chair. "It is causing quite a bit of chaos in the household."

"Chaos? In your home? Unprecedented," Grantaire said dryly.

Joly looked up irritably as the bottle, upset by the sudden influx of noise, scampered back to the safety of Grantaire's feet. Grantaire half-heartedly tried to push it away, to no avail.

"Do you mind?" Joly asked in a harsh whisper. "I am attempting to perform a delicate operation here."

Bahorel raised his hands in contrition and, in deference to Joly's irritable demand, did not speak even to apologize for having done so. Joly shot him a sharp look to ensure that this silence would continue, then returned to the apparently painstaking task of coaxing the shyest bottle away from Grantaire's boots and back into the open. Grantaire, outwardly unmoved by the whole thing, took a long drink from his glass and practically dared Bahorel to mention the concerned furrow of his eyebrows as he observed the hesitant bottle. Bahorel, who had promised Joly his silence, only smirked and crossed his arms again.

Joly had almost managed to entice the bottle into touching him when the door burst open once more and Bossuet positively blew in, clutching his hat with one hand and a rather bedraggled volume in the other. “That’s it,” he declared, throwing his hat to the ground and terrifying the bottles thoroughly in the process. The most timid of the group abandoned Joly’s outstretched hand and took refuge behind Grantaire’s ankles once more.

“What’s it?” Joly asked with a sigh. He did not rebuke Bossuet his racket as he had Bahorel, a situation that only Bahorel’s affection for Bossuet and respect for his and Joly’s friendship prevented him from loudly protesting.

“I am done with libraries,” Bossuet informed him. “Should you require more books and find yourself unable to acquire them yourself, I’m afraid you will have to rely on other friends to run the errand for you. I have, as you know, undying affection for you and an infinite respect for the time you put into your studies, but it seems that librarians so not have the same affection or respect for me, and I have repeated the experiment enough times at this point to be quite convinced that the results will not vary no matter which variables are altered. I say, when did Grantaire’s collection gain the power of locomotion?”

“Three days ago,” Grantaire said. “And you might have better luck in libraries if you didn’t treat bookshelves like particularly knowledge-filled walls and attempt to woo any maiden reading from them. Toppling shelves and inciting indecent noises are hardly the way to endear one to librarians, harpies and killjoys that they are.”

Bossuet ignored the slight on his character to focus on the bottles eyeing him dubiously from where Joly still lay. Without any regard for his already battered coat and trousers, he plopped himself on the ground. “Are you branching into the veterinary sciences, Jolllly?” he asked. “Or would you classify the treatment of such creatures as being the purview of botanists? Either way, I had not thought you ready to give up the study of _Homo sapiens_ quite yet. Has the medical school its own Monsieur Blondeau, who takes joy in driving as many students from his ranks as possible, for entire self-sacrificing reasons, of course.”

Bahorel snorted but otherwise did not break his vow of silence.

“No, nothing like that,” Joly assured Bossuet, reaching out and claiming his book without taking his eyes from the bottles. The book vanished into one of the many precarious stacks of tomes that littered the floor near the bookshelf, stacks which went a long way to explaining both Joly and Bossuet’s persistent troubles with librarians. “But who am I to deny help to a friend in need? Hippocrates would turn in his grave were he to learn that one of his pupils was disregarding his oath so.”

“Hippocrates is fortunate to have such a dedicated pupil as you,” Bossuet said with a grin. “But what, precisely is the trouble? They seem quite lively to me.”

Joly turned severe eyes towards Grantaire, clearly insisting that he be the one to explain the problem. Grantaire once more refused to meet anyone’s gaze, clearly deeply embarrassed to find himself in such a situation, though whether the embarrassment came from the admission of his ignorance or the admission of his affections Bahorel could not be certain. In a few mumbled words he explained his situation to Bossuet. Any attempt at personal callousness he might have tried to convey was completely ruined by the fact that he had begun to absently scratch the neck of the shyest bottle, large fingers caressing the glass as delicately as they would have a kitten.

Bossuet considered the problem gravely, scratching his chin and making aborted attempts at stroking a non-existent beard. Bahorel, who had had ample time to consider the issue and had come up with more than one potential solution, stayed quiet and waited for both medical man and philosopher to put forth their suggestions. At last Bossuet offered, “Have you tried offering them wine? Perhaps they merely need to be refilled.”

Joly was shaking his head even before Bossuet finished. “They are not vampires! Would you offer a starving child the blood of its brothers? Even if it might be an effective remedy, it overwrites any usefulness with barbarity of the most appalling kind.”

“Anyway, they won’t drink it,” Grantaire said with a sigh. “Or did you not think I had considered that option already?”

“Of course they won’t,” Joly said primly. “They are creatures of class and dignity, aren’t you?” This last was addressed to the small tavern of bottles he had accumulated, several of which rubbed up against his hands in seeming agreement. Bahorel had the sudden and deeply unpleasant realization that this must be how other felt when he conversed with his own belongings; he resolved to devote himself to studying the tongue of the bottles at the earliest possible moment to avoid prolonging the feeling of mediocrity any more than necessary.

“How about crushed glass?” Bossuet suggested. “We eat the flesh of other creatures; might they not consume the flesh of other glasswares?”

“And taint the wine within?” Grantaire demanded. “Surely not. No bottle of _mine_ would consent to such desecration, I assure you.”

“Have you tried it?” Joly wanted to know. “Anyway, I hope you have not taken to indulging from these particular bottles. They are sentient creatures now, and they look to you for protection. It would be the height of cruelty to betray them so, and I know you are not so wicked as that.”

Only Joly, Bahorel thought as Grantaire spluttered to deny the accusation, could tell Grantaire that he was not wicked and get away with it. From anyone else, Grantaire would take such a statement as a deep stain on his character and distract everyone with a long rant about the inherent wickedness of humanity; from Joly he accepted it as inevitable truth. Not for the first time, Bahorel reflected that it was fortunate indeed that Joly had no taste for tyranny, or he would find the road to throne and empire open to him in no time.

“Spices,” Bossuet said thoughtfully, pitching his voice over Grantaire’s continued sputterings. “Has anyone considered offering them spices?”

“Capital suggestion,” Bahorel said before either Joly or Grantaire could find objections to this new suggestion. “Have you any to offer them?”

Both Joly and Bossuet shook their heads. “Too many spices make me ill, and Bossuet prefers to eat outside the home,” Joly said by way of explanation. “Grantaire?”

“You think I walk around with a pocketful of pepper?” Grantaire demanded. “Perhaps in Nice that is customary, but among Parisians it has yet to catch on. The city herself has means enough to let a man know that he still lives without his peers carrying around spices to do the job. Or do you perhaps enjoy falling into a spasm of sneezes each time the wind catches one of your friends the wrong way? You surprise me Joly. I would have thought someone of your delicate constitution more sensible than that. Or is cure by bodily function all the rage among your philosophers these days? If so, I think I shall be avoiding any medical institution until the fashion passes. What is it, do you think, about the medical profession that requires its cures to be even more unpleasant than the malaises it attempts to overcome? A moralist would say that we are being punished for putting ourselves in harm’s way, but that does seem quiet cruel to all the women and children who end up in your tender care. Or perhaps God is wise enough to punish infants for sins they have yet to commit and thus spare us even more wickedness, though one wonders then why it is the children of the poor who seem to succumb to his justice most often. Do you think you can pay the Divine medical indulgences and earn pre-emptive forgiveness? Is God just as enraptured with the modern era as our leaders, worshiping as they do at the alters of money and prestige? And why shouldn’t he be? What do the poor have to offer him other than their demands? If I were God I too would prefer the company of the rich, wouldn’t you?”

“If you were God then rivers would run wine and all girls would walk around with neither stocking nor sleeve,” Bahorel said dryly. “And I believe Joly was referring to the contents of your kitchen rather than your pockets.”

“My kitchen is as barren as my heart,” Grantaire informed them.

“Bahorel?” Joly asked.

Bahorel shook his head. “I am entirely devoid of supplies at the moment, I regret to say,” he said. “My last dinner drained my shelves entirely and I’ve yet to find a supplier I trust to restock them. I have leads on one, but I haven’t yet found the time to properly examine his wares. Jean Prouvaire, perhaps?”

“Wait!” Bossuet had been rummaging through his pockets as they spoke, and now he withdrew a small pouch which, when opened, turned out to contain a small amount of crushed cinnamon. “Would this do?”

“Dare I ask how you acquired that?” Bahorel asked.

“It was…” Bossuet began, then shook his head. “No, no I don’t think you should.”

Bahorel’s eyebrows crept up and Bossuet shrugged. “I seem to recall you have an aversion to elephants,” he explained.

Bahorel shuddered. “By all means keep your secrets if they involve those monstrosities,” he declared.

“ _I_ want to know,” Grantaire said.

“Remind me to tell you over breakfast sometime,” Bossuet said. “It is a story that rather requires refreshments, all things considered. Shall I offer it to them or try pouring it in?”

“How would you feel having someone forcing cinnamon down your throat?” Grantaire demanded. “Show a little decorum, man!”

Bossuet shrugged and laid the pouch on the floor. All four men in the room waited to see how the bottles would react to the offering. For a long moment, it seemed that the experiment would be as much a failure as the previous ones. Then, slowly, one of the bolder bottles left the safety of Joly’s coat and started towards the pouch. It bent over nearly horizontal, balancing precariously on the very edge of its base, and poked its neck into the small pile of powdered spice. A moment later it rocked back with a splash and an explosive clink and shook itself vigorously. Joly started forward, but Grantaire shook his head.

“It is only sneezing,” he said with a sigh of resignation. “Why they insist on shoving themselves neck first into every new thing they come across I have no idea, but I have yet to break them of the habit.” Seeing his badly hidden fond expression, Bahorel made a mental note to never allow Grantaire to attempt training any of the pillows; the experience could only end in disaster for everyone.

The bottle, wary but still apparently interested in the cinnamon, repeated the balancing act more cautiously, nudging the powder warily. Even as the men and bottles watched, it managed the feat of allowing some of the spice to trickle down to meet the liquid inside. A moment later it began clinking excitedly, practically wriggling with excitement. At its delighted noises, the rest of the cellar made its way to the pouch, and within a moment the air was filled with clinking as each of the bottles fought to have a taste of the cinnamon. The men looked at each other.

“That seems to answer that question,” Bahorel said after a moment. “Grantaire, I think you shall have to populate your kitchen a little after all. Would you care to join me in my search for a good spice shop?”

Grantaire sighed and, as the bottles began to bicker loudly and incomprehensibly amongst themselves, said only, “I will meet you when your courses start tomorrow.”


End file.
